


There's A First Time For Everything

by megzseattle



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Developing Relationship, Fluff, M/M, demons don't do valentines day, ineffable husbands, more vague duck allusions than you can shake a stick at, valentines day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-14
Updated: 2020-02-14
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:46:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22708699
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/megzseattle/pseuds/megzseattle
Summary: Demons don't do Valentine's Day. Until they do.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 18
Kudos: 79





	There's A First Time For Everything

**Author's Note:**

  * For [EveningStarcatcher](https://archiveofourown.org/users/EveningStarcatcher/gifts).



> This was written for the Tumblr GO valentines day swap and was originally posted there. It's for @eveningstarcatcher. Set very early in their initial dating relationship, before they are living together, and not really part of the serpent and seagull series universe (although it could be!) 
> 
> Happy Valentines Day, and to those of you who were waiting for Friday's chapter to finish of the By Any Other Name story, I'm sorry but I'm a bit behind! 
> 
> Enjoy!

“Dearest,” Aziraphale said, rolling over in the morning light to run a hand up Crowley’s back. “You know what next Friday is, don’t you?”

Crowley raised an eyebrow. “Uh… a Friday?”

“Anything else?”

Crowley thought. He thought some more. He came up with nothing. “No,” he finally said, admitting defeat. “I really don’t. What is it?”

Aziraphale smiled encouragingly at him. “It’s our first Valentine’s day since we officially became a couple.”

“Oh… Oh angel,” Crowley groaned. “You have to know that demons don’t celebrate Valentine’s Day. It’s pretty much not allowed. That’s all about your side – angels and cherubs shooting their tiny, adorable arrows into someone’s posterior. We mostly just stay home and get drunk on days like that.”

“I thought we didn’t have sides anymore,” Aziraphale said a little sadly.

“We don’t! We don’t! It’s our side for sure, angel,” Crowley said, backpedaling. “It’s just – old habits die hard and the day kind of gives me the creeps. All that forced happiness and fake romance.”

Aziraphale’s smile faltered a little. “So – so you don’t want to do anything to celebrate?”

Crowley rolled over onto his side to face the angel. “I didn’t say that! I want to celebrate being with you. I _love_ you, you know that. I just don’t want to do it on Valentine’s Day. I want to do it _every_ day. Besides, did you know he’s the patron saint of epilepsy, too? It’s not like we’re going to go have a seizure in his honor, are we?”

“I did not know that,” Aziraphale sniffed, “and no we aren’t.”

“Plus, really, the truth behind the legend is just gross, angel. He wrote a letter to a woman who’s sight he had restored and signed it “from your Valentine” right before he was beaten to death with clubs. Beaten. To Death. That’s hardly romantic, is it? And he was just signing his name, anyways.”

Aziraphale rolled out of bed and pulled on his tartan dressing gown. “It certainly is not,” he said distantly. “You’ve made your point, my dear.”

Aziraphale made his way into the bathroom, and a few minutes later Crowley heard the bath running and caught the scent of the vanilla bath salts the angel preferred lately. He smiled, happy to have settled that argument in his favor, and threw on some clothes to go out and get the angel some pastries and a coffee.

\--

“Heya, angel,” Crowley said, the shop door jingling behind him as he returned. The angel was sitting at his desk working on something. “Brought you a coffee and a chocolate muffin.”

“Thank you my dear,” the angel said with a smile, taking the offered sweets and turning back to his work. “You’ll pardon me, I hope, but I just have to get started on the new inventory.”

“Oh,” the demon replied, surprised. “I thought we were going to the park.”

“I’d love to, but a new shipment came in yesterday, and you know I’ve been trying to keep the records more up to date.” Aziraphale straightened his bowtie. “I’m afraid I have to get this done while it’s still fresh in my mind or I’ll mix up all the details.”

That, Crowley knew, was a lie. Aziraphale never forgot the slightest detail about any book in his collection. Sometimes he liked to play a game where he wandered around the shop at random and pulled a book out of some obscure corner and asked Aziraphale some obscure fact about its printing date, number of pages, where he bought it from, or what it was worth – and honestly, the angel had never missed once. Not once. He knew that even if the angel put the new shipment in a corner for the next hundred years, he would never lose track of any of the info he needed to know.

Crowley plopped down on the couch and observed the angel through narrowed eyes. What was he up to? He took a deep sip of his cappuccino and contemplated. Could it have been the epilepsy comment? Was that insensitive to sick people?

“You know,” Crowley said casually, “I have nothing against epileptics.”

Aziraphale turned and gave him a strange look. “What a relief,” he said acerbically.

Crowley met his gaze in confusion. “Well – yes,” he sputtered. “I didn’t want their to be any confusion.”

Aziraphale shook his head the tiniest amount, then turned back to his desk and picked up his pen.

\--

Crowley, unable to take the odd and rising level of tension in the shop, eventually fled, pleading “demonic errands,” and instead went down to his favorite local pub for a whiskey and a talk with his friend Diana, the bartender.

“So,” Diana said, leaning forward on the counter. “What’s got you in here at two in the afternoon?”

Crowley ran a hand through his hair. “It’s Aziraphale,” he admitted. “He’s being weird.”

Diana looked around and noted that her only other customer seemed quite contented with the pint in front of him, and settled in for a talk. “Weird how?”

“I dunno, it’s like maybe he’s upset with me about something? But I haven’t done anything and I don’t know what it could be.”

“Anything unusual happen this morning?”

“We were talking about Valentine’s Day,” he said.

“And?”

“And I told him that my people don’t celebrate that, and that Saint Valentine was in no way the patron saint of romance, and he got horribly butchered, and it’s a sappy holiday for suckers.”

Diana stared at him flatly, her dark brown eyes flashing. “Can’t imagine what might be bothering him,” she said heavily.

“What?”

“It’s your first time in a couple in a long time, isn’t it?” she asked with a smirk.

“So what if it is?” Crowley realized his voice sounded a tad defensive.

His friend reached behind the counter and poured them both a shot of something. He sniffed it suspiciously, decided he didn’t care what it was, and downed it in a single shot.

“Listen up,” she said, fixing him with a strong look. “ _You_ might not think Valentine’s Day is important, and that’s all well and could, but what if _he_ thinks it’s important?”

“He’s an –” he started to say ‘ethereal being’ and stopped himself by the skin of his teeth. “He’s a sophisticated, urban, educated person. He’s never shown any interest in this kind of thing in all the years I’ve known him. And I’ve known him for a long, long time.”

Diana thought for a moment. “In all of that time you’ve known him, has he ever been in a relationship on Valentine’s Day before?”

Crowley thought. “You know, I don’t think so.”

She raised an eyebrow. “And so –”

“And so? Spit it out, woman.”

She rolled her eyes. “It’s his first one. You’re newly in love. Perhaps he’s gotten a little caught up in it.”

Crowley felt the blood drain from his face.

He was a fool.

He was a bloody, enormous fool.

Of course Aziraphale was excited about it. Aziraphale loved rituals and holidays and got excited about each and every one of them. And of course he’d never had an opportunity to have anyone make a fuss over him on a romantic holiday before. And he had rained all over the angel’s happiness about it with his morbidity and jadedness.

He dropped his face into his hands. “Oh, for the love of – “

“You’re an idiot,” Diana supplied helpfully.

“I am,” he said agreeably. “What do I do?”

“Well,” she said, “you just have to figure out some way of showing him that he’s special. You can figure it out.”

“How did you get so smart?” he groused. “And pour me one more, will you?”

“Comes with the territory,” she said, reaching for the good stuff.

\--

“So,” Crowley said that night as they were watching a film and working their way methodically through a takeaway curry or two. “I was thinking about that Valentines thing you brought up this morning.”

Aziraphale kept his eyes on the television but raised his eyebrows in curiosity. “Were you?” he asked.

“I think I may have spoken a little rashly,” he said.

“Oh,” the angel said, dismissively, still following the action, “no you didn’t, really it’s fine.”

Crowley waved a hand and paused the screen. “Listen to me,” he said, “I’m trying something new here.”

Aziraphale turned to him, uncertain. “And that would be what?”

“I’m saying – you’ve never had a Valentine’s Day before. I’ve never had one either. Maybe it would be fun to do something.” He swallowed. “You know. Since we –” He made a hand waving gesture that somehow encompassed the room, the shop, the two of them, and, he hoped, his feelings.

Gestures, he thought, could say so much.

Aziraphale gave him a tiny, knowing smirk. “Oh, well, when you put it that way,” he said slyly.

Crowley rolled his eyes. “I’m saying I’m game for Valentine’s Day,” he said. “Let’s make it a good one, okay?”

Aziraphale smiled happily. “Well if you’re sure,” he said.

“Leave the planning to me,” Crowley said. “I’m on top of it.”

\--

“What are we doing tonight?” Aziraphale asked the following Friday. “You haven’t actually told me.”

“It’s a surprise,” Crowley said. “Just wear something nice and be ready at eight for me to pick you up.”

He went home to Mayfair and worked hard on an outfit and double checked his plans on his mobile. Dinner reservations were all set. He straightened his tie in the mirror and set out with a jaunty swing to his step to go get his angel. He had even chosen a new CD from a shop earlier in the day, something old-fashioned and croony that he knew the angel would like, and he unwrapped it quickly, snapping away the plastic, and put it in the stereo at a low volume as he made his way across town. If he was lucky, they’d make it through most of the night before it reverted to Queen.

Besides, he thought, if inside he was pretending it was just an ordinary date night, it was no one’s business. He didn’t need bloody February 14th to be romantic; he was Anthony J. Crowley and he could be romantic any time he wanted. But if it was important to his angel, he was going to do his best to show him a good time.

He stopped at the door of the shop, thought for a minute, and knocked instead of entered.

It took a few minutes for Aziraphale to answer the door. He looked surprised when he did. “You knocked?” he asked. “Why didn’t you come in?”

Crowley took a moment to appreciate the angel in his nicest cream-colored suit, one he usually only wore to weddings and other special occasions. Unlike the rest of his clothing, this outfit had the advantage of being both made in the current century and also being more form fitting that most of the heavy layers he usually wore, revealing his shape nicely. He’d paired it with a pale blue tie that matched his eyes almost perfectly.

“Ngk,” he said, then cleared his throat and started again. “I wanted to pick you up at the door for our date. You know. Old-fashioned, like.” He held out an arm to Aziraphale.

Aziraphale gave him a deeply dimpled smile and took the offered arm, allowing Crowley to escort him to the passenger seat.

“You look nice,” he added on the way.

“So do you, my dear.”

\--

Later that night, after their dinner at a quiet, intimate Italian place, after a walk in the park during which the moon was somehow more full and brighter than any weatherman had expected, after a late night gelato at a local shop that unexpectedly had no other customers and all of the angel’s favorite obscure flavors, they wandered back to the bookshop and nuzzled together on the couch.

“Did you have a nice night, angel?” Crowley said. “I’m sorry the restaurant was so loud, and that the cocoa powder on the tiramisu made you sneeze, and I hope the duck incident on our walk didn’t –”

“My dear,” Aziraphale said, “what on earth are you talking about? Tonight was perfect. Just perfect.”

“But the duck took the – right out of your -- ” Crowley spluttered.

“Crowley,” Aziraphale cut in more firmly. He took the demon’s hand and all but forced him to be silent. “Listen to me. It was lovely, and romantic, and perfect. No one has ever made such an effort for me before. It meant the world to me.”

Crowley made a strangled noise in his throat and, finding speech impossible, decided to focus instead on simply not bursting into flames. He thought cooling thoughts. Water. Ice. Hailstorms. Freezer sections at the grocers.

Aziraphale, seeing his conflict, leaned in and gave him a slow and tender kiss. “Happy Valentines Day, my love. I hope we have many more.”

“We will have all of them, angel,” Crowley mumbled, before kissing him back. “Every single one.”


End file.
